What are the smoke alarm rules for a Texas rental?

Where the Alarms Go

A landlord must install at least one smoke alarm in each separate bedroom. In addition: if the dwelling uses a single room for dining, living, and sleeping, the alarm must be inside that room; if multiple bedrooms are served by the same corridor, at least one alarm must be in the corridor in the immediate vicinity of the bedrooms; and if the dwelling has multiple levels, at least one alarm must be on each level (Sec. 92.255(a)). A typical four-bedroom corridor house needs four bedroom alarms, one hallway alarm, and one on any second level; a split plan with bedrooms off two corridors needs an alarm in each corridor. Bedroom means a room designed with the intent that it be used for sleeping (Sec. 92.251(1)), so the study a tenant sleeps in is the tenant's choice and the fourth bedroom on the plat is the landlord's duty.

Battery or Hardwired

For a dwelling occupied as a residence, or with a certificate of occupancy, before September 1, 2011, an alarm installed under Sec. 92.255(a) may be battery powered and is not required to be interconnected, except that an alarm replacing one that was in place when the unit was first occupied must meet the residential building code that applied to the unit on that date (Sec. 92.255(b)). Newer homes carry hardwired, interconnected alarms under the building code, and a replacement has to match what was there. The subchapter also does not stop a city from enforcing fire-safety requirements in its building, fire, or housing code, including the type of alarm (Sec. 92.252(a)(2)), so the corridor cities' adopted codes still govern new work. Installation follows the manufacturer's procedure, on a ceiling or wall with the placement limits in Sec. 92.257.

The Test at Move-In, and the Duty During the Lease

The landlord must determine that each smoke alarm is in good working order at the beginning of the tenant's possession, by testing with smoke, by operating the test button, or by following the manufacturer's recommended procedure (Sec. 92.258(b)). During the lease and any renewal, the landlord's duty to inspect and repair exists only after the tenant reports a malfunction or asks for an inspection or repair (Sec. 92.258(c)); the landlord complies within a reasonable time considering material, labor, and utilities (Sec. 92.258(d)). Damage or malfunction caused by the tenant, the tenant's family, or guests is not the landlord's duty unless the tenant pays the reasonable repair or replacement cost in advance (Sec. 92.258(c)). The move-in test is the line that matters: it is the one duty that does not wait for a request, and the move-in report is where it gets recorded.

The Seven-Day Clock and What a Miss Costs

A landlord is liable under the subchapter if no alarm was installed at initial occupancy as required, or if the landlord does not install, inspect, or repair the alarm on or before the seventh day after the tenant gives written notice that the tenant may exercise remedies if the landlord does not comply within seven days (Sec. 92.259(a)). A written lease may require that the tenant's initial request be in writing (Sec. 92.259(b)). The remedies split by which failure it was. For either failure: a court order to comply while the tenant is in possession, a judgment for damages, and court costs (Sec. 92.260(1), (2), (4)). Only for missing the seven-day written notice: the civil penalty of one month's rent plus $100, attorney fees on that claim, and unilateral termination of the lease without a court proceeding (Sec. 92.260(3), (5), (6)). A missing alarm on day one is a violation the tenant can get fixed by court order and sue over for damages; it becomes a penalty and a lease the tenant can end only after the written seven-day notice goes unanswered. The landlord has a defense if the tenant had not paid all rent due on the notice date, or had not paid costs the landlord was entitled to request under Sec. 92.258 (Sec. 92.261). Set against a ten-dollar battery alarm, the statute is not subtle.

The Tenant's Side: Pulling the Battery

A tenant who removes a battery from a smoke alarm without immediately replacing it with a working one, or who knowingly disconnects or intentionally damages an alarm so that it malfunctions, is liable to the landlord for the damages that result (Sec. 92.2611(a), (b)), except where the malfunction traces to the landlord's own failure to repair within a reasonable time after a request (Sec. 92.2611(c)). The landlord's fuller remedies, a court order, a civil penalty, and fees, require two things: a lease notice in underlined or bold print that the tenant must not disconnect or damage an alarm or remove a battery without replacing it (Sec. 92.2611(d)(1)), and a separate written notice, given after the landlord discovers the problem, that the landlord will exercise those remedies if the tenant does not fix it within seven days (Sec. 92.2611(d)(2), (d-1)). No separate notice, no penalty. That is one more of the conspicuous-print clauses a Texas lease has to carry to mean what it says.

How We Run It

Every alarm is tested at the move-in walk and the result goes on the move-in condition report with the date, because Sec. 92.258(b) is the duty that runs without a request and the report is the proof. Batteries are replaced at every turnover regardless of the test. A tenant report of a chirping or dead alarm is a same-week visit, not a seven-day countdown, because the penalty starts at day eight and the fire does not wait for either. The lease we use carries the bold-print notice against disabling an alarm, and the tenant hears it at signing.